Past Scholarship Awards

1. Abigail Santos Terrazzino (Tagalog, TN)
2. Hayat Ullah Noory (Dari, GA)
3. Carroll Phillips (French, MD)

Americans Against Language Barriers (AALB) is an Illinois-based 501(c)(3) non-profit organization aiming to improve the health of patients with limited English proficiency. They do this by training professional medical interpreters, providing interpreter services to healthcare organizations, and lobbying for policy reform. They envision a future where language services are seamlessly and freely available across the healthcare system.

1. Mafikiri Fata-Marc (Swahili, French, TN)
2. Agnieszka Markowska (Polish, IL)
3. Sanjoy Dutt (Bengali, Hindi, Nepali, OR)
4. Siriporn Bhanont (Thai, Lao, IL)
5. Roody Aupont (Hatian-Creole, MA)

Atrium Health is a nationally recognized leader in shaping health outcomes through innovative research, education and compassionate patient care. Based in Charlotte, North Carolina, Atrium Health is an integrated, nonprofit health system with more than 70,000 teammates serving patients at 40 hospitals and more than 1,400 care locations. Ranked nationally among U.S. News & World Report’s Best Hospitals in eight pediatric specialties and for rehabilitation, Atrium Health has also received the American Hospital Association’s Quest for Quality Prize and its 2021 Carolyn Boone Lewis Equity of Care Award, as well as the 2020 Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Health Equity Award for its efforts to reduce racial and ethnic disparities in care. Atrium Health believes that good communication is essential to high-quality, compassionate healthcare. All care locations of Atrium Health can provide interpreting services in-person or over the phone, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. While the in-house interpreters speak mostly Spanish, remote interpretation services are offered in more than 200 languages, including American Sign Language (ASL) for the deaf and hard-of-hearing patients.

Spring 2022 recipients:

1. Eunjung Han (Korean, CO)
2. Geraldine (Geri) Hernandez (Navajo, AZ)
3. Zakia Siddiqi (Pashto, Dari, WA)
4. Chau Minh Trang Tran (Vietnamese, MD)
5. Mohammad Haroon Walizada (Dari, Pashto, WA)

Fall 2021 recipients:

1. Arif Hussain (Hindi, Urdu, MA)
2. Sarah Bendaly (French, MN)

Cross-Cultural Communications (CCC) is the only national on-site and online training organization for medical and community interpreting, with more than 380 licensed trainers in 43 U.S. states, Washington, DC, Guam, and six other countries. CCC provides training, consulting, and curriculum development, including training of trainer (TOT) programs. Our courses train bilingual staff as well as freelance interpreters. Our core program, The Community Interpreter®, is a 40-hr certificate foundation program for medical, educational, and/or social services interpreters. Under our imprint, Culture & Language Press, we publish interpreting textbooks, workbooks and trainer’s guides sold in more than 30 countries and all 50 U.S. states. Our online training platform, Blue Horizon, provides self-paced and live online programs in medical, community and legal interpreting.

1. Gabriela Brumar (Romanian, IL)
2. Getachew Haile (Amharic, Oromo, WA)
3. Maggie Ann Herrera (Navajo, NM)
4. Innocent Ndizeye (Kirundi, Swahili, Kinyarwanda, French, KY)
5. Thi Diem Duyen Pham (Vietnamese, NC)

InterpreterEd.com specializes in training bicultural and bilingual individuals in the knowledge and skills needed to become qualified medical or healthcare interpreters and to successfully obtain professional certification. Our 40-hour training program is language supportive. We provide bilingual course materials and coaching for all students, whatever their language of service. This course is offered via in-person and live, online formats. We also offer a selection of continuing education courses on topics of specific interest to healthcare and medical interpreters.

1. Chintana Barden (Thai and Laotian, WA)
2. Asami Iba (Japanese, IL)
3. Monika Kopec (Polish, IL)
4. Dennis Pham (Vietnamese, CA)
5. Di Shao (French, Quebec)

1. Ganga Ram Adhikari (Nepali, PA)
2. Monica Feijo Desbiens (Portuguese, CA)
3. Naomie Florestal (Haitian Creole, MA)
4. Yulia Rosario (Russian, TX)
5. Shengfei Wen (Cantonese, CA)

ALTA has more than 30 years of experience providing language and cultural solutions to businesses, government agencies, and nonprofit organizations. Employee-owned since 2011 and headquartered in Atlanta, ALTA has built strong relationships with language professionals worldwide. ALTA’s Interpreter Training department is dedicated to the development and delivery of fresh, relevant, and engaging curriculum for medical interpreters at every level.  Their highest priority is providing quality training with a superior client experience.

1. Nayshunda O. Burke (ASL, GA)
2. Laureta Comeau (Albanian, MA)
3. Galina Iancu (Romanian, NC)
4. Hom N. Pokhrel (Nepali, MN)
5. Natalia Wolff (Russian, IL)

The National Council on Interpreting in Health Care (NCIHC) is a multidisciplinary organization whose mission is to promote and enhance language access in health care in the United States. The NCIHC started as an informal working group in 1994 and met yearly until it was formally established in 1998. The group is composed of leaders from around the country who work as medical interpreters, interpreter service coordinators and trainers, clinicians, policymakers, advocates and researchers. The NCIHC is a membership organization.

CCHI Commissioners donated their speaking engagements honoraria to the 2019 Fall Scholarship cycle.

1. Chakraborty, Priyanka (Bengali & Hindi, DE)
2. Gilchrist, Troy Gilbert (Vietnamese, NM)
3. Gonzalez Salvador, Brigida (Mixteco, CA)
4. Lima, Rubem Silva (Portuguese, MN)
5. Szpyrka, Aneta Magdalena (Polish, NY)

Voices For Health® stands by its mission to “improve access to healthcare, education and social services through comprehensive language and culture solutions.” Their personalized approach, experience and expertise help customers to meet the language needs of limited-English speaking and Deaf/hard-of-hearing individuals and families.

1. Seyma Albarino (French, IL)
2. Tila Chan Dhimal (Nepali, PA)
3. Nou Hli Lee (Hmong, MN)
4. Natalya V. Ishenin (Russian, OR)
5. Hien Thithu Tran (Vietnamese, MO)

TransPerfect is the world’s largest privately held language services provider with the mission to provide the highest quality language services to leading businesses worldwide. TransPerfect is certified to ISO 9001:2015 and ISO 17100:2015, ensuring the highest level of quality and service for all projects. Its global group of companies completes over 50,000 projects per year and works with many of the world’s most recognizable enterprises.

1. Dhungana, Bhim P. (Nepali; OH)
2. Farah, Said M. (Somali; MN)
3. LeVering, Maria (Russian; UT)
4. Matos Leslie, Maria Celia (Portuguese, KS)
5. Prasad, Jay Sh. (Nepali; TX)

Liberty Language Services is a language services agency providing Your Total Language Solution— language access services to hospital systems, medical offices, legal firms, courts, public schools, state and local government agencies, universities, private companies and more. Core capabilities include on-site, face-to-face interpreting services, over the phone interpreting, video remote interpreting, and interpreter training. Liberty Language Services also offers other language services such as written translation, and American Sign Language (ASL) services. The company prides itself on offering unparalleled and quality services, by professionally trained interpreters and translators, at an affordable cost, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

The Upper Midwest Translators and Interpreters Association (UMTIA) is a chapter of the American Translators Association (ATA) serving the geographic region of Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, South Dakota, and North Dakota. UMTIA’s mission is to offer local educational opportunities for translators and interpreters, and to promote professional discussions and networking.

1. Ozlem Avci (Turkish, CA)
2. Marina Fatieva (Russian, MN)
3. Vedran Saldo (Bosnian, Serbo-Croatian, MO)
4. Ze Xiong Yang (Hmong, WI)

MARTTI is a leading video medical interpreting provider with more than 250 languages available on-demand and with nearly 60 of those languages available in live video. Their services improve operations, financial performance, and the quality of care for Limited English Proficient, Deaf, and Hard-of-Hearing patients. The company’s focus on healthcare means MARTTI can concentrate on patient communications and draw industry-specific insights that enhance clinical decision-making, drive better outcomes, and improve patient satisfaction, which makes their client hospitals even stronger. MARTTI is committed to innovation—upgrading infrastructure, Interactive Voice Response, telemedicine, and other emerging technologies—and to supporting professional standards of interpreting.

1. Briscoe, Pornwipa L. (Thai; CA)
2. Foster, Marcia N (Portuguese; GA)
3. Maldonado Hernandez, Domingo (K’iche; OH)
4. Ntunzwenimana, Marc (French, Kirundi, Kinyarwanda; ME)
5. Tagarian, Mehdi (Farsi; WA)

Fluency Inc. is a leading Software as a Service provider that provides spoken and American Sign Language agencies efficient, industry-leading tools to schedule, track, invoice and document face-to-face interpreting encounters. By supporting the professionalization of interpreters through our contribution, we strengthen the capacity and continued excellence of our partner language agencies nationwide, thereby improving language access for our nation’s millions of LEP people in a virtuous cycle of accountability and quality assurance.